GEOGRAPHIC LITERA TURE 141 



ingly indefinite and general terms. The following extracts from the ■ 

 present report are expressed in terms neither indefinite nor unnecessarily 

 general. 



"A railroad is essentially a monopoly. This is literally true as to all 

 local points upon its line which are reached by it alone. It is only at 

 competitive points — that is, at points where traffic can be carried by two 

 or more lines — that the railroads become actual competitors. It results 

 from this fact that, as a rule, competitive points gain at the expense of 

 non-competitive points. . . . The natural result of railway compe- 

 tition, it may be fairly said, is to create preferences between localities. 

 • • 



"The same thing is true of preferences between individuals. . •. . 

 Considered a priori, therefore, we should expect that railway competition 

 would produce preferences and discriminations between communities and 

 between persons. "What might to a large extent be expected has actually 

 occurred beyond all legitimate excuse. 



"One of theoutcomes of these railway abuses was the act to regulate com- 

 merce. The purpose of that act was largely to do away with preferences 

 and discriminations. It also aimed to keep alive competition between 

 railways by prohibiting pooling arrangements. In other words, it en- 

 deavored to eradicate the results and to perpetuate the cause. . . . 

 To one familiar with actual conditions it seems practically out of the ques- 

 tion to establish rates that are relatively just without conference and 

 agreement ; but when rates have once been established the act itself re- 

 quires that they shall be observed until changes are announced in the 

 manner provided. Certainly it ought not to be unlawful for carriers to 

 confer and agree for the purpose of doing what the law enjoins. . . . 

 The logical way to remove these evils would be to remove their cause. 

 If unrestricted competition produces discrimination, one obvious way to 

 prevent such discrimination is to restrict competition. . . . We are 

 inclined to think . . . that time has demonstrated the futility of 

 attempting by criminal enactments to secure absence of discrimination 

 in railway rates so long as independent ownership and unrestrained com- 

 petition exists. We are inclined to think that competition should be 

 restricted ; but if the railroads are allowed to agree for that purpose, such 

 conditions should be imposed as will fully protect the public interest." 



While the ideas of the commission have developed they have not 

 vacillated. The conditions which must be imposed in the interest of the 

 public are those that were advocated a year ago, though it is now easier 

 to discover the broad and intelligent spirit of compromise which no one 

 doubts will lead the commission, whenever amendatory legislation can 

 be secured, and would have led it at any time in the past, to make every 

 reasonable concession which will not endanger the rights of the public. 



The report contains the usual review of the year's work in railway 

 regulation and a brief historical sketch of traffic associations. 



It is rather curious that the attention of the commission does not ap- 

 pear to have been directed to the very remarkable and unusually success- 

 ful Chicago-Omaha pool, which antedated by four years the " Saratoga 

 conference," and, unlike the latter, produced substantial results. It was 

 an investigation of the operations of this pool that led the Railroad Com- 

 mission of Iowa to declare that pools constitute " the only agency that 

 can compel the through traffic to bear, as it should, its proportion of the 

 interest on the cost of maintaining and operating the roads." 



One turns with relief from the report of the commission, with its dis- 

 heartening record of legislative inefficiency and inertia, to the report of 



